About / Purpose and scope

Methodology is part of the scientific question

The EPM Consortium studies the decisions that connect physiological assessment, exercise prescription, research design, and scientific reporting.

Why this matters

Studying the method, not only the outcome

An exercise study may ask whether a training programme changes a physiological or performance outcome. A methodological study asks how the programme was defined in the first place.

Exercise intensity can be prescribed using maximal values, thresholds, critical-power models, heart rate, ratings of perceived exertion, or combinations of these. Each approach carries assumptions. Test protocols and analytical choices may also alter the anchors available to a researcher.

Examining these choices can improve the clarity, comparability, and interpretation of exercise research. It may also help identify where reporting standards, validation studies, or direct methodological comparisons are needed.

The Consortium model

Early-career and project-led

The Exercise Prescription Methodology Consortium is an international, project-led collaboration of early-career researchers working to improve how exercise is assessed, prescribed, studied, and reported.

Membership is organised around work that members are ready to lead or meaningfully support. The primary route is to propose a methodological project. A contributor route allows researchers to offer relevant skills and interests without leading a project immediately.

The current focus is strongly connected to cardiorespiratory, aerobic, and endurance exercise. The Consortium’s name and public language deliberately allow the methodological scope to develop over time.

Priorities and ambitions

A clear distinction between now and next

The Consortium is at an early stage. Present priorities are areas of active attention, not a claim that every activity is already an established programme.

Present priorities

Develop methodological research through small, project-specific working groups.
Support discussion, peer input, and appropriate contributions to members’ developing or existing studies.
Build useful networking and collaboration between early-career researchers.
Facilitate staff or research-student visits and exchanges where practical opportunities arise.
Maintain an annual meeting associated with the ECSS Congress.

Longer-term ambitions

Multi-centre methodological studies.
Collaborative funding applications.
Responsible data-sharing initiatives.
Seminars, workshops, sandpits, and scientific meetings.
Activities that support members’ career development.

Working forum and advice

Private discussion, invited experience

Slack is the Consortium’s private working forum for introductions, methodological questions, project channels, and updates. It is not a public discussion space. Access may be provided manually after an application has been reviewed and accepted.

Established senior researchers are not the intended audience for the standard membership pathway. One or more senior colleagues may occasionally be invited separately as mentors or advisers when their experience would be useful.

Boundaries

What we are not

Clear boundaries help applicants understand the Consortium’s role and avoid expectations that a research collaboration cannot meet.

A professional regulator or accreditation body.
A commercial consultancy.
An automatic route to authorship.
An unrestricted public Slack community.

Interested in how projects move from a question to a working group?

Read how we work